Alberta Prime Minister and Health Minister to Speak on COVID-19 Update Monday Afternoon | The Canadian News

Alberta Prime Minister Jason Kenney and Health Minister Jason Copping will attend a COVID-19 update on Monday afternoon.

Kenney and Copping will join Alberta Health Services CEO Verna Yiu and Health Medical Director Dr. Deena Hinshaw for the update at 3:30 pm Global News will broadcast live media availability on this story post.

A press notice on the availability said officials will provide an update on COVID-19 in Alberta and ongoing work to protect public health.

This will be the first COVID-19 update Alberta has made since Canada identified its first cases of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 over the weekend, in Ottawa.

On Monday morning, Ontario’s chief physician, Dr. Kieran Moore, confirmed that the two travelers who have been identified as the first cases of the Omicron variant in Canada first entered the country through Montreal International Airport. -Trudeau before continuing to Ottawa.

Ottawa Public Health is now conducting contact tracing to see if anyone else has contracted the virus in relation to the two original cases.

Moore said Monday that the province is looking at four more cases, two more in Ottawa and two in Hamilton, as possible instances of the Omicron variant.

On Friday, Hinshaw took to Twitter to say that Alberta’s genetic sequencing program can detect mutations of the virus, including the new strain.

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Monday’s update also comes a day before Alberta Health Services’ deadline for its mandatory COVID-19 vaccine policy for all employees.

In late August, AHS announced that by October 31 all contracted employees, medical and midwifery personnel, students, volunteers, and healthcare providers must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

On October 22, AHS announced that it was extending that deadline to November 30. With the pressures of the fourth wave of COVID-19, AHS said it wanted to make sure to provide employees with every opportunity to get vaccinated and present tests.

As of Friday afternoon, there were 5,017 active cases of COVID-19 in Alberta. There were 455 people hospitalized with the disease, and 90 of those patients were being treated in intensive care.

So far, 3,235 people have died of COVID-19 in Alberta.

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